the young victim had become “an object of revenge” for his mother

Nathalie Stéphan has been appearing since Monday February 6 before the Assize Court of Angers for the assassination of her daughter Vanille in 2019, the day of her first birthday. After having explored the CV of the accused the day before, the court heard this Tuesday the relatives and the psychiatric and psychological experts. They studied the personality of the forties.

In her cubicle, she is motionless and taciturn, as though stunned by her medication. Since appearing on February 6 before the Assize Court of Maine-et-Loire, Nathalie Stéphan has struggled to explain the reasons which led her to murder her daughter Vanille on her first birthday, February 7, 2019.

As an answer to the many questions of the court and the public prosecutor, only one sentence manages to come out painfully from his mouth, when it is not simply “yes” or “no”.

“Why did you choose to take your daughter’s life by wrapping tape around her face several times?” tries the Advocate General. “To make it work. So that she doesn’t look at me. – To protect you? – Yes. – For revenge? – Yes.”

After a first day of hearing dedicated to the reminder of the facts and the personality of the accused, three expert psychologists and psychiatrists who marched to the bar on February 7, 2023 – four years to the day after the facts. According to them, Nathalie Stéphan does not suffer from any alteration or abolition of discernment: she would have a borderline personality which can make her “dangerous“, which makes him systematically blame the other. Here in this case, social services.

[Pour Nathalie Stéphan,] justice is not competent, because she gave only one reminder to the law to her incestuous father. At school, they “left her”, they “don’t give a damn about her”, these are phrases that contaminate her speech. She feels abandoned by the institutions, she is animated by a hatred against the social services.

Dr Helene Vergnaux

psychiatrist expert

According to psychologist Claire Fichant, her daughter would have become a “object of vengeance“, which could explain why the experts did not detect any trauma in the defendant after her inexplicable act.

“This act, she committed it to deprive the others of Vanille’s presence. His death is like a punishment aimed at pointing out the failure of social servicessummarizes the psychiatrist Hélène Vergnaux. It defends itself with a unique splitting mechanism: either the other is all good, or he is all bad. It protects it from a collapse.”

Earlier in the morning, the court received the testimonies of the few people who made up the entourage of Nathalie Stéphan before the facts. Her ex-companion, D., delivered a moving testimony at the very beginning of the day, bringing a tear to the cheek of the accused. “I’m scarred for life, traumatized forever,” he told the court. It was with him that Stéphanie Stéphan had a first daughter, now 14 years old, and who no longer wishes to hear from her mother.

There is her older brother, Mathieu*, 47, just as reserved as the accused, who confirms at the bar the despotic character of their father, deaf and dumb like their mother. “It complicates communication with others.” he slips, his head down.

Then comes the youngest of the Stéphan siblings, Mickaël *, 40, much more experienced and accompanied by a legal aid dog. The accused, he calls her “Vanilla’s Murderer“and declares to have”ashamed to be his brother“. He remembers the corrections of their father, the fridge attached by a padlock so that the children do not have access to it.

Impregnated with the testimonies of the day, the court questions Nathalie Stéphan again at the end of the hearing. “Could Vanille have a future without you? asks the president, very pedagogue since the opening of the trial. – Ouisighs the accused. – Then, why this act? – I only thought of myself.“

*The first names of the two witnesses have been changed